June 02, 2007	Saturday	Jamadi-ul-Awwal 16, 1428

LAHORE, June 1: Minister for Railways Sheikh Rashid Ahmad on Friday announced that rail fare would not be increased in the next fiscal year and that the administration had spelled out new priorities to increase the revenue by other measures which included bringing down operational expenses.

He said the main focus of the railways administration would be on curtailment of the running time of express trains and rehabilitation of the rolling stock to augment its compatibility with other public transport services.

Announcing the decision taken by the railways administration in implementing the new operational policy, Sheikh Rashid told a news conference that the journey time between Lahore and Rawalpindi would be reduced to three and-a-half hours compared to around four and-a-half hours at present.

Similarly, trains would be faster by two to three hours for the travel between Lahore and Karachi. New timings would become effective from June 15, he said and added that the railway administration would reduce stoppages and remove other operational snags to speed up express trains on the mainline network.

The minister announced introduction of a daily non-stop fast train between Lahore and Mianwali from June 30. He said the journey would take eight and-a-half hours for which the track had already been improved. The train would leave Lahore at 10:30pm and reach Mianwali at 6:30am. Similar operational hours would be observed for the return journey, he said.

He said the rakes of all the express trains would be replaced by new ones starting with the Tezgam which would operate with the new rake from June 20. The rakes of freight trains would also be replaced and the administration was considering a proposal to introduce a new freight train from the Mugahlpura railway station.

The minister also announced that a summary for an increase in the salary and revision of pay scales was being sent to the prime minister. Besides, he said, the administration had decided to give incentive awards to all categories of the operational staff on a monthly basis to encourage efficient train service.

The railways administration, he said, had prepared a contingency plan to rehabilitate 36 old locomotives for which spares had been imported. The plan would help the PR lessen burden on public money that was to be spent on the purchase of new locomotives. He said the PR workshops were capable of rehabilitating locomotives and other rolling stock and this potential was being exploited to avoid unnecessary spending.

E-TICKETING: The issuance of train tickets on credit cards began on Friday while the process of selling tickets through emails would begin within a month, said the minister.

He said the administration had compiled a booklet on the property and open land owned by the railways and this information would also be available on its website.

BULLET TRAIN: Sheikh Rashid once again insisted on the introduction of a bullet train between Lahore and Rawalpindi and cited a recent survey which selected the Lahore railway station as the originating station for this train.